GermanPod101 Review: Table of Contents

Audio Lessons

The main lessons are available in audio format and feature a native speaker and a non-native speaker. The lessons are short and to the point (about 10-12 minutes) and usually follow this pattern:

Dialogue at normal speed

Dialogue slowed down

Dialogue with English translations

Vocabulary discussion

Grammar discussion

Cultural pointers

They have a good balance and by listening to them you get a greater understanding of not only the language, but also the culture behind German.

The Online Lesson Player

(Note: You can download all the lessons to listen on your computer or device as well.)

This is what the online audio lesson player looks like. Here you can listen to the full track, mark it as complete so you can follow your progress. On the lesson page you can scroll down for a wide variety of other activities.

Favourite lesson to save for later

Listen to special versions of the audio, like the target language only or listen to the review tracks to review the important words from the episode.

Download Transcripts and Notes

Review vocabulary from the lesson and add them to your flashcards.

Interact with the GermanPod101 team and ask questions, or give them feedback on the lesson.

Video Lessons

On top of the 600+ audio lessons, you also get access to 200+ video lessons. These are very short videos that enhance your skills by having you practice answering questions, listening to sentences and more.

This means that you get access to over 800 lessons to learn German online when you become a member. I won't spend too much time in this Germanpod101 review to discuss the videos, as I consider them mostly bonuses.

Flashcards

Your membership also comes with a lot of tools and resources to help you learn.

One of my favourite resources are the flashcards they offer.

I' a regular user of Memrise, but the GermanPod101 flashcards are amazing. Here's why.

They are the same vocabulary you hear in the main lessons, so you get to hear them being used in practice and you get more exposure to them.

The main word bank features 2000 words with pronunciation and example sentences for all entries. If you know 2000 words you're quite fluent in a language, usually. Once you've mastered the 2000 words on GermanPod101 you can "graduate" to getting your vocabulary from native material such as books, newspapers and television.

The interface works fine. It's not as good as Memrise, but I can live with it.

Multi-Device Support

Innovative Languages focuses a lot on portability, so if you’re the type to learn languages on your commute, while doing chores or basically anytime you’re not in front of the computer you have a few options on how to best make that happen.

You can download ALL episodes in DRM-free mp3 format and simply transfer them to your mobile device.

You can download the Innovative Languages app from the app store and stream any lesson.

This is what the app looks like on a few different devices:

The app is quite convenient and allows a truly mobile experience of the lessons.

This is perfect if you have good connectivity and would like to be hands-on with the learning.

By using the app you have access to all the features on the go which is FAR superior to just downloading the audio files as I was doing for a while.

Innovative Languages also have a free flashcard app called “Word Power” for a few languages including German, but to me this felt a bit clunky and I couldn’t really get into using it – strongly preferring to learn German online with the web-based version, where I could see the example sentences and stream the audio effortlessly.

What does it cost?

GermanPod101 offers 3 levels of paid membership. Note you can still get a lot of their basic lessons and word of the day for free.

Basic: Grants you access to all the lessons for a few bucks per month. You get no access to full transcripts and the many tools they have, but in terms of value for money this is incredible.

Premium: Gets you access to all the lessons, including everything from comprehensible transcripts to a vast array of tools you can use to make your learning more fun. The recommended level.

Premium+ is like Premium, but you also get access to a teacher from GermanPod101. If you are super motivated and have the money this is a luxury option.

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All views are my own and any sponsored posts or reviews will be clearly signed as such.